I have friends who have bought this. Despite the website's claims, it is not suitable for children who are just starting to learn to read, but it sounds like you've already done some reading with your child.

The phonics used by it are shaky at best; these books were not carefully written and designed to scaffold the learning process. They do not start out with simple words and slowly introduce harder ones nor do they build on patterns to let children recognise sounds; they start with mostly easy words with random difficult ones thrown in. There is little structure as you go through the books in this way - they are not building up to anything, just carelessly leaving words in that aren't suitable for the reading level.

As far as children's books go, they're pretty good and fun for most children, but the phonics they are based on are definately not water-tight. If you want fun books that your child might enjoy, go for it, and he or she can learn to read as with any other book, but if you are truly after a proper phonics learning system, you might want to look at a some other options first.

Thanks I do the same for just about anything I want to buy. I forgot to go to amazon. But I was looking at e-bay and saw that people had a lot of them to sell. Sometimes when you see something not available for sale, that might be an item people keep for future generations and hooked on phonics was widely available.

I would expect Amazon to have postive reviews about products it sells, KWIM? But I'm still leary of HOP.

If you want something that has always been a proven, successful phonics method that is fun, look for Sing, Spell, Read 'n Write._________________Married to Mr. Ellie for over 30 years
Mother to 2 dds and 2 dsil
Grandmother to 1 sweet boy
Caretaker of 2 budgies

We used Sing, Spell, Read & Write with my later siblings. SSRW used to market heavily to homeschoolers, but some years ago they decided they were going to focus on schools or something of that sort and shifted away from homeschoolers. It made no logical sense - there are millions of homeschoolers and more every day and it was a lucrative business for them. Mom's a little annoyed about that still. I'm sure SSRW is available if you go search for it, but most new homeschoolers probably aren't going to hear about it and will buy something else instead. Oh well._________________Homeschool Articles - Events - Support Groups

We used Sing, Spell, Read & Write with my later siblings. SSRW used to market heavily to homeschoolers, but some years ago they decided they were going to focus on schools or something of that sort and shifted away from homeschoolers. It made no logical sense - there are millions of homeschoolers and more every day and it was a lucrative business for them. Mom's a little annoyed about that still. I'm sure SSRW is available if you go search for it, but most new homeschoolers probably aren't going to hear about it and will buy something else instead. Oh well.

I know. It's a shame, too.

Shekinah Curriculum Cellar still sells it, happily._________________Married to Mr. Ellie for over 30 years
Mother to 2 dds and 2 dsil
Grandmother to 1 sweet boy
Caretaker of 2 budgies

My youngest dd had a lot of success with Hooked on Phonics. After going through it, she was reading Lord of the Rings in 2nd grade. My oldest dd didn't need it. Every child is different so it is just a matter of picking something that works for your child._________________Many blessings,
Susan

Well, we ended up getting Leapfrog Tag reader and so far so good. It keeps my 5 yer old entertained and she is learning. However, I realize now that I need sheets to work with. In other words, if it's long u that she is working on, I need a story written that would allow her to practice reading as I am afraid she might have memorized the words in the Leapfrog reader. I try to go back to the original ones but I need something to apply this to. All the web sites I visited don't have anything specific or I just put the wrong wording in the google search.

We use Hooked on Phonics and LOVE it. My daughter is a very visual/hands on learner. Prior to HOP, we tried ABeka and Explode the Code. HOP is the one that is really working for her.

By the way, the last time I checked, Christian Book has the HOP classroom sets for only $10 per grade level. You get the workbook, a teacher book, a bunch of flash cards, flip books, books, and large laminated story cards in the set. It's definately worth $10. However, it doesn't come with the video DVD. I eventually decided to go ahead and buy the kit from HOP so we can get the DVDs. (Some of the videos can be viewed on the HOP YouTube account.)

I do not regret buying the $10 kit as there are a lot of things that my daughter uses out of it. So, the only thing I'm using out of the HOP DVD kit is the DVD. I figure I'll just sell it on ebay when we are done with each level.